The last book I read in 2014 was The Wanderer by Timothy J. Jarvis.

It's a horror novel (because what better time than Christmas for a little horror?) that loves what horror can be. The structure of the book is very aware of itself. A manuscript that describes something supernatural is found in the apartment of a recently disappeared author. But before you know even that, the first words of the book are an excerpt from that author's story:

"What is it?"
"An old manuscript. Much of it is hard to make out, but..."
Mr. Leatherbotham cut in.
"What? That worn-out old Gothic trope?"
He rolled his eyes.

The whole book careens along through the various stories (a demonic puppet show, a variation on Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came, and an homage to Lovecraft, among others) that come from chance meetings with strangers (another self-aware nod to "weird tales" and horror stories) while updating the main plot. It only perhaps loses steam once or twice but quickly finds its footing. The Wanderer is a book where a word like ichor feels right at home. The vocabulary is extensive and the description is remarkable. The prose is described as poetic in more that one place, and it's easy to see where that comes from. The description is concerned with things often visceral, often gory, often downright repulsive. Horrible things are happening in The Wanderer. And they keep happening.

I loved it, the main plot of an immortal man fleeing an immortal pursuer while all the stories spin out around him worked really well and put this right up there among my favorite reads of the year.